Paul Irwin on his personal story, from youth work to founding Trylife, making the world’s most complex interactive digital films, gaining 7m Facebook followers and doing a lot of therapy. (#7)

Charity Impact

“The power is in your pocket (your phone) to change the world.”

In this episode, we discuss Paul’s story from being put into ‘care’ by the council as a teen which was actually just a B&B, to benefitting from youth work and then becoming a youth worker and going on to create Trylife, which has made a difference to so many disadvantaged young people. We discuss the co-production process, working with professionals and young people to create the most complex interactive film ever made, gaining 7 million Facebook followers, future plans and the deep work Paul has done during the pandemic to address his own mental health.

“TryLife interactive film series... You Make The Choices... You Live With The Consequences... You TryLife...”

Paul Irwin, founder of TryLife.

Paul Irwin has a background in working with disadvantaged young people from around the world. He created an interactive film series “TryLife” aimed at educating young people about the consequences of their actions. If you remember the old choice-based adventure books, TryLife is an interactive digital video version of those books, tackling real issues facing young people:

• Episode 1 – drugs, alcohol and sexual health
• Episode 2 – knife crime and gang violence
• Episode 3 - mental health and suicide
• Episode 4 – child sexual exploitation and grooming
• Episode 5 – isolation and loneliness
• Episode 6 – continuing on from episode 5, characters coming out of Covid lockdown
• Episode 7 – teenage pregnancy and perinatal mental health.

Paul’s talent at creating and curating content has also seen incredible success in social media. He has amassed a huge following via TryLife, reaching up to 188,000,000 people per week. In one month, TryLife managed to reach 65% of all Facebook users in the USA with no marketing or advertising spend and using just one mobile phone.

Paul was the very first winner of the HRH Pitch at the Palace awards which is arguably the UK’s most prestigious competition for tech startups. Most recently, he started developing an interactive film with the heads of the Bloods, Crips and Mexican Mafia in South Central Los Angeles with the support of Facebook and the producer of Bladerunner.

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The purpose of the Charity Impact podcast is to learn more about how effective charities and individuals achieve social change or social impact. This podcast is for anyone who wants to make a difference, but particularly those who are working for social change / impact; including charity trustees, CEOs, staff, volunteers, advisors, philanthropists and public service professionals.